Attentive readers will know that here at Wings Over Scotland we’ve been exhaustively detailing the 32-year trailer campaign for the fabled “positive case for the Union“. Well, despite our cynicism it’s finally here – the “Better Together” website, launched today, has a whole page devoted to describing the positive case (or as they’d have it, the “+ve” case, which the page URL mischievously translates to “-ve”) in detail.

Stand by to be blown away.

“Prosperity

Times are really tough at home and really turbulent internationally. In the future Scotland’s prosperity will be strengthened by keeping the British connection.”

In an uncertain world Scotland’s security will be strengthened as part of the United Kingdom. As part of the UK we have real clout in the UN Security Council, NATO, the EU, and we have Embassies around the world.”

We’re reasonably sure Scotland could still have embassies under independence. They’re just offices. We’re also pretty comfortable about doing without the “clout” that enables us to start illegal wars leading to the deaths of hundreds of British troops and up to a million Iraqi civilians, and has left the country still in ruins and chaos almost a decade later, with dozens of terrorist murders every single month.

And we’re absolutely certain that the UK’s actions are the single biggest threat to Scotland’s security. Nobody had ever tried to set off a suicide bomb in Scotland before we invaded Iraq and Afghanistan. No country has attempted to invade Scotland in the last thousand years. Well, except one.

“Interdependence

As Scots we believe there’s nowhere better, but we understand there’s something bigger. By contributing to and benefiting from the multi-national, multi-ethnic and multi-cultural United Kingdom of the years ahead, Scotland’s society and culture will be enriched.”

Replace the words “United Kingdom” in that paragraph with “Europe”. Still works. Replace them with “world”. Still works. If multiple nationalities, ethnicities and cultures are a good thing, surely the more the better? So why restrict ourselves to the parochial, insular, sometimes outright xenophobic UK? Why not just take our own seat at the table like every other normal country on the planet, without having our views “interpreted” for us through our “big brother” at Westminster?

“Hundreds of thousands of Scots and English have made their homes in each other’s nation. Half of us have English neighbours. Hundreds of thousands of Scots were born in England.”

Um, so? Scots and English people will still be able to live in each other’s nations after independence, like all EU citizens can at present. English neighbours will not be forcibly repatriated (or, indeed, non-forcibly). Scots will still be able to be born in England, and vice versa. Right now, if you’re born while your Scottish parents are on holiday in the Dordogne, you don’t suddenly become French.

And that’s all they’ve got. Those three pillars represent the entire “positive case” as put forward by the “Better Together” campaign. Black is in fact white: illegally invading Muslim nations (at the behest of a man who now hilariously bills himself a “Middle East peace envoy“) makes us safer, not more at risk; chaining ourselves to a large, terminally bankrupt neighbour makes us richer; wanting to engage more, not less, with the rest of the world makes us “separatists”; our feelings can best be voiced by letting bigger, tougher countries speak for us (and choose our governments for us). War is peace. Freedom is slavery. And most importantly of all, ignorance is strength.

So the next time you hear a Unionist use the phrase “stronger together” (or its menacing twin, “weaker apart”), readers, remember what it is they mean by “strong”.

53 to “Revealed at last: the positive case”

‘Better Together with a Tory government at Westminster that none of us voted for’.

End of message.

I watched the Better Together video on their website and I have to say, after watching this assembly of greetin-faced unionists, these people don’t deserve independence! Equally , however, they don’t have the right to condemn the rest of us to live under these truly awful British governments, whether it’s Labour’s war criminals or the Tories who wage war on the Scottish poor and low paid.

There are some real gems in this video though. I particularly liked the woman, who captured the contradiction in terms that is the No campaign, when she said, “We have one of the best education systems in the world at the moment and I wouldn’t want that to change”. Oops.

Another woman tells us, “We’re guaranteed our schools, we’re guaranteed our hospital care”. What does she think will happen after independence, that we’re going to abolish schools and hospital care? Wonder if she’d change her tune if she lived down south where, for years now, both Labour and Tory governments have been busy privatisisng England’s health and education system.

My favourite, though, has to be Patsy from Craigneuk. Just when you thought all the laughs had ended, Patsy imparts the following pearl of wisdom:

Jesus H. Christ! I think the woman who was praising Scotland’s education system should have a word with Patsy.

Patsy reminded me of the old joke:

What’s the difference between Scotland and a public toilet? The Tories wouldn’t piss all over a public toilet.

And that seems to be the subliminal message that these Scottish Labour zombies want to communicate to us. What we need is more British wars, more British weapons of mass destruction, more British privatisation, more British public spending cuts, more British anti-trade union legislation, more British poverty and inequality, more British isolation from Europe. Even then, you get the sense that these people still wouldn’t be happy, they’d want even more after that.

Although the consequences of a No vote in 2014 don’t bear thinking about, if, God forbid, it does happen, then if I ever hear any of these greetin-faced unionists complaining about the Westminster Tories again, I will personally staple their tongues to David Cameron’s arse. Come to think of it, most of them would probably be quite happy with that arrangement.

But stay tuned folks, it can only get worse, as we’re about to discover.

YesYesYes is quite right, I found those particular lines in the promo video extremely galling. These people are not good adverts for the Scottish education system, as they lack the ability to perform basic reasoning and follow simple logic. Our separate Scottish education system is the best in the world (therefore, by definition, better than the one run by Westminster) so therefore this is somehow proof that Scotland shouldn’t run everything else? Education and health (again, both separate from UK models) have been guaranteed, and this is a reason to spurn our ability to guarantee other aspects of Scottish life?

Not to mention the most basic fallacy of their arguments – what are they are being guaranteed against? Oh, that’s right – WESTMINSTER INTERFERENCE!

Sorry, but this video does nothing to convince me that I’m wrong in thinking that unionism is the preserve of the thick.

As for the -ve case,:

“Times are really tough at home and really turbulent internationally.” – Oooh, better cling onto the apron strings then. Reminds me of that joke: “I don’t want to go to school, you can’t make me!” “But you’re the teacher…”

“In an uncertain world Scotland’s security will be strengthened as part of the United Kingdom.” – Oooh, all that dreaded uncertainty. I’m so glad there’s no uncertainty in the UK. Just think of all those under 25s just now thanking the lord they’re in the UK, knowing their homes are guaranteed, even if they lose their jobs (not that such a thing would happen under the certainty of the union).

“As Scots we believe there’s nowhere better” – How arrogant. Who are we to say we’re better than Norway, Denmark, Finland, Luxembourg, Austria, or anywhere else in the world?

Fear. Nothing but fear. Might as well just have big letters saying “AAARRRGGGHHH!!!!! EVERYTHING IS REALLY SCARY SO DON’T GO OUTSIDE, ESPECIALLY AROUND OCTOBER 2014!!! STAY IN YOUR HOMES AND NAIL THE FUCKING WINDOWS SHUT!!!!”

I thought that the Bitter Together video was actually just a warm up video, you know to get all in the right mood for the blockbuster to follow. Oops, I think I made a wee mistake there! 😆

What on earth was that eejit going on about, “I don’t want to feel foreign when I visit England” Jeez! What happens when she travels outside of the U.K. at present? Oh that’s right Johnny foreigner looks at her and says “oh look she’s from Britain, best we don’t make her feel foreign!”

I think it was that patsy Patsy who started off going on about Community councils. W.T.F.? I think she’s been out in the sun too long! 😆

So there we have it folks, the reasons to vote NO.
No Education system
No Hospitals
No Community Councils
Feel foreign on foreign trips
There’s no way back (Thank the lord for small mercies!)

Remember folks, try and keep the laughter down to a dull roar. We don’t want to upset the little darlings just yet, after all it is their FIRST video.

When I got to work this morning, a colleague told me the village where I live had been featured on morning TV as a “typical Scottish village” where people want to stay in the union. I just went out to the car park just now and fixed my “Yes for Scotland” sticker on my car. If I’d known the No campaign were going to pull this stunt, I’d have done that earlier and left the motor parked prominently in the Main Street.

If you wanted to make a video of what a Scottish political version of the Stepford Wives would look like, this is it.

Some may take the position that insulting these people doesn’t do the independence cause any good. But these people are insulting our intelligence, so they are fair game. This is what really encourages me about the No campaign. They really do believe that the people of Scotland are fools and that we’ll buy into this nonsense.

This video has the mendacious paw-prints of Scottish Labour stamped all over it. We all know that one of the reasons for Scottish Labour’s support for devolution in the 1990s was their belief that it would create the impression that it gave Scotland some limited protection against the policies of Tory governments at Westminster. So for Scottish Labour, devolution was about self-interest. We would be so overwhelmed with gratitude at Scottish Labour’s constitutional generosity that we would forever be in their debt that they had ‘saved’ us from the Tories.

But this self-interest wasn’t something that could be aired in public. Scottish Labour hoped that we would come to see for ourselves that devolution gave us this limited protection against the Westminster Tories. The reason that Scottish Labour couldn’t dwell on this point about devolution providing limited protection against the Tories is because that would have conceded the point that Scotland NEEDS to be protected from Westminster governments in the first place.

And you can’t argue in one sentence that Scotland needs to be protected from the policies of Westminster governments and then, in the next sentence, argue that we’re stronger together weaker apart. Even the Stepford Wives in Scottish Labour understood that that kite was never going to fly. What they didn’t factor in to their calculations in the 1990s, was that not only would devolution provide very little protection against the Tories but that, after thirteen years of Labour being in power, Scotland would also need to be protected from the policies of Labour governments at Westminster.

And so we end up with the nonsense in this video. It’s just vacuous claptrap. You’d have to be brain-dead to buy into this. I’m proud of the fact that I have a high enough opinion of my fellow Scots (or at least a sufficient number of them) that they will see through this crap and vote Yes in 2014. The MacStepford Wives, on the other hand, may be a lost cause. But if they really don’t mind the Westminster Tories so much, why the fuck don’t they just vote for them rather than the wee pretendy Tories with the red rosettes?

Like most Scots I have friends and family throughout the world so I’m somewhat puzzled when Alistair Darling asserts that “I don’t think people want to make foreigners of their friends and relatives”. What does he mean by this? Is he suggesting that my friends and family resident outwith Scotland but within the UK are somehow superior to those from other countries?

I know it all too often said but I think the appearance of the “video” is another example of the slow but sure dying death throes of Labour in Scotland. The “video” is supposed to be from all kinds of people who support the Bitter Together campaign, however, as YYY says, it reeks of the stench of Labour.

Occasionally I will feel just a brief inkling of injustice after putting up a post about one or other of the D.B. However, in the case of the “video” I stand with YYY. I have absolutely no remorse in ripping this piece of garbage to shreds. This “video” should be put forward for the award for “Best comedy video of 2012” I’m sure it would be a runaway winner! 😆

Aside from the arguments being put forward by the NO campaign being patent rubbish, I think Alistair Darling’s demeanour was really quite interesting.

Not sure if others agree, but I watched his body language, and as he recited from his autocue, I thought, ‘does he look enthusiastic or passionate’? Did Darling appear to really fervently believe in what he was saying?

My instinct is, that he didn’t. He was like somebody merely ‘going through the motions’, and that, I do believe, is where the negative NO campaign is going to fail. They are not espousing something for which they are truly passionate, and as sales 1.01 tells you, ‘enthusiasm sells’ – oh, and ‘people buy from people they like’ – which kind of kicks the whole no campaign into touch, straight from the (as those separatists in the USA would say) get-go.

Am I just being really stupid here (careful Mac :lol:) or does this seem a really stupid statement to be making?It was not that Scotland could not survive as a separate, independent state: “Of course it could. This is about what unites us, not about what divides us.”

The way it reads to me is that the D.B. are AGREEING with the YES camp that Scotland can become an Independent country. Well HELLO THERE! that’s what we are all fighting for!

Since when exactly did the debate about Independence suddenly get turned on its head and become one about staying in the Union?

@YESYESYES
“Although the consequences of a No vote in 2014 don’t bear thinking about, if, God forbid, it does happen, then if I ever hear any of these greetin-faced unionists complaining about the Westminster Tories again, I will personally staple their tongues to David Cameron’s arse.”

I think we should get some T-shirts done with that quote and give them out to the yes campaign 🙂

Rev Stu,
Those who think by voting NO, are voting for the status-quo, and that things will remain the same, ought to think their vote through.
One of the first actions Westminster (lead by the band of Scottish labour m.p.s no
doubt) would be to reclaim some of the more important devolved acts,(“well you voted NO to independence!) first off reclaim “national planning” that would allow
them to authorise the building of Nuclear Power stations, one on the west coast
one on the north coast,and for good measure one on the east coast,(“well you voted NO to independence”, also planning permission to upgrade the Nuclear submarine base on the Clyde for future subs (“well you voted NO to independence!).
next?, how about territorial waters and sea beds?, instead of individual waters of Scotland, Ireland, Wales?, and England, we (Westminster) will declare by legislation that henceforth these waters would be known as British territorial waters.
(“well you voted NO to independence) thereby at a stroke Westminster would gain
all the oil,fishing,also wind,wave and tidal power.
And that would only be the very tip of a dirty iceberg, some on here my say “they
canna do that!!) but others know Westminster are capable of any dirty moves
especially if they want to teach us a lesson, which they would!!.
It goes without saying that Scotland would NEVER be able to even think about a
referendum again (“well you voted NO to independence”!).
Aye, and we will leave the subs rotting away at Rosyth

Scott, we somehow need to find a way of getting his way of Lib/Dem thinking out there to the people of Scotland.
He is living proof that there is life in the non SNP parties.
There are people in the non SNP parties who do think for themselves.
The more people like this come out of the woodwork the better we will all be in the long run.
Part of me says I’d love for him to join the SNP, but realistically I think that would be a bad move. For now I’m happy for him to remain a Lib/Dem, maybe after Independence he can give the SNP some consideration. 😀

I’d be willing to say that some of the more pragmatic Lib Dems see the achievement of their party policies as nothing more than a pipe dream within the United Kingdom, especially given the Tory Lackey job they have wound up in, but that Independence may alter the balance.

It is exactly this type of person that we need to provide a positive vision of the future for, one where they may actually make the difference in society they got interested in politics for.

I think you are right Scott.
I think post Independence Scotland is going to be a very exciting place to be, politically speaking.
Hopefully, post referendum, the next Holyrood elections will return the SNP to power for a third term. This would, in my view, be the best post Independence outcome. We will need the party that took us to the Independence referendum to take us into Independence “proper” and start getting Scotland on its feet and starting to get involved Internationally.
Ach, best leave that for now, I’m getting carried away. 😆

“I do think that the ‘Yes’ campaign will have to go negative at some stage to deal with the – probable – dystopian outcome that a ‘No’ vote would imply.

It would not happen immediately, but everything that does make Scotland a different country from the rest of the UK would be destroyed. There would be no Hollyrood, no separate NHS, no arguement aboout nuclear power stations or the placing of WMDs on our land. Our legal system would be fully under the control of Westminster dictat. All resources would be exploited for the greater good of the short termism of the Treasury. People would flood out of a country which was unable to attract inward investment. Education would be decimated.

All of this and more would be couched in completely ‘reasonable’ terms. We would, after all, have agreed that we needed to stay close to nurse.

We, by tweaking the tail of the Lion, because we elected an SNP government, would be expected to conform to a Unionist agenda when we bottled it.

So, what is at risk is not the status quo. It is our very being.”

I posted it elsewhere and no-one has anything to say about it. As I think that that is what will happen given a ‘Yes Together’ vote, I’d be interested in the views of others here.

I like the way the Yes campaign is also co-opting the phrase “The Best of Both Worlds”.
If ever a nation was like the Borg – soulless, mercenary and lusting after nothing beyond acquisition and utility – it was the UK…

Are the BBC going for heavy irony tonight? We’ve had 20 minutes on Newsnight with a panel of insular Little Englanders bitching about the horrors of being integrated into Europe, and feeing English first and British second and European nowhere. All the really TERRIBLE consequences of allowing Europe to have any say over England’s affairs are being paraded with the best doom and gloom they can muster. They’re currently calling for a referendum.

I suppose in another five minutes we’ll go to Newsnicht, and it will be ochone ochone, we have to stay together and let Big Brother keep running our affairs.

O.K. folks. We all know the Bitter Together campaign was launched yesterday and the Cameroon Bar pulled the rug form out underneath their feet with his Benefits announcements. Well what can I say, I think it has just got a wee bit worse for the Bitter Together campaign.

Time, methinks, for our elected representatives both in Westminster and Holyrood to start firing all those Freedom of Information requests in.

Let’s get this news out to the media, and around the world. The U.K. signs up to a U.N. agreed figure of annual world aid but for 42 years has failed to meet the agreed figure! Sorry folks but this STINKS!

We have to hit these b******s hard. They have to be made aware that we have had enough of their lying, their deceit, their fraud!

Compare this to what Salmond said at the Yes launch, that he didn’t think Scotland was better than anywhere else, but he knew we were just as good. I like that humble attitude far more than Darling’s British “we’re the best!” attitude.

Plus I don’t actually believe Darling means what he says anyway, otherwise he would have quit Westminster and come up to Holyrood…

Well, yes, that appears to be the fabled unioncorn case for the union.

In short :

— it’s better to be chained to a non-industrial paper economy that is based on slave labour wages and is destroying public services via privatisation so that the poor will enjoy a new definition of the word poverty.

— it’s better to be aligned with a nuke bearing, war-starting nation that still imagines that Britannia rules the waves.

— it’s better to be run by right-wing governments who decide all fiscal/social policy (Tories of all colours — and Tories are all there is); even though in Scotland we detest such stuff as nightmares and third world countries are made of…

‘I like that humble attitude far more than Darling’s British “we’re the best” attitude’.

One of the many notable differences between British nationalists and Scottish nationalists is that British nationalists really do believe that their ‘country’ (Britain) is the greatest nation on earth (as Tony Blair put it in his farewell speech to his constituents in Sedgefield in the north of England). British nationalists really do believe that Britain is better than other countries, that the ‘British’ way is the best way.

And British nationalists can barely hide their contempt for other nations, particularly smaller nations. Think, for example, of some of the deeply offensive remarks that Iain Gray made about Iceland and Ireland, or the cringingly embarrassing questions that Jeremy Paxman asks any Greek guest on Newsnight (or any guest from any EU country for that matter!), or the latent racism of the ‘lads’ on Top Gear.

You can magnify this in all other areas of ‘British’ life – the broadcasting and print media, politics, the economy, sport, relations with the EU, international relations and so on (it’s a long list). The defining characteristic is the depiction of the plucky, even-handed, rational Brit trying to get untrustworthy, back-sliding, hot-headed Johnny Foreigner to see reason (where ‘reason’ is synonymous with the self-evident virtues of the ‘British’ way). British nationalism is a nationalism that is not only characterised by its superiority complex but it is a pernicious nationalism that also, even today, has designs on other countries.

What is referred to as Scottish ‘nationalism’ is often as much a reaction to these deeply offensive characteristics of British nationalism as it is to any supposed ‘virtues’ of Scottishness. What the unionists don’t get is just how deeply offensive the behaviour, attitudes and worldview of their ‘nation’ (Britain) is, to those of us who support Scottish independence. Whether it’s British weapons of mass destruction, British military adventurism, Britain’s undemocratic institutions and practices, British contempt for other nations, Britain’s superiority complex or any of the other pernicious manifestations of the British state and polity. We’re done with it. We don’t want to be associated with it anymore.

I think this should have been the launch video for the Bitter Together campaign instead of the drivel they actually had. At least this video explains exactly what the Bitter together campaign comprises of! 😆

Either someone didn’t do their homework properly, or rather they did but didn’t tell the Muppets! 😆

Comment - please read this page for comment rules. HTML tags like <i> and <b> are permitted. Use paragraph breaks in long comments. DO NOT SIGN YOUR COMMENTS, either with a name or a slogan. Ignore these rules and I WILL KILL YOU WITH HAMMERS.